


However Improbable

by Zigster



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Banter, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Magical Realism, Oblivious John, Pining Sherlock, Plot changes abound, Reading Tea Leaves, Sherlock's mind is drugging itself with magic, Slow Burn, The skull has a name and it's Basil and he's a bit of a dandy, There is no east wind, violin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-05
Updated: 2017-12-06
Packaged: 2019-01-09 13:13:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 19,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12277194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zigster/pseuds/Zigster
Summary: Sherlock has relapsed into a drug addled fog of confusion and pain. Or has he? When John finally walks back through the door of 221B he'll be stepping into a world of magic that he never knew existed.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Not beta'd but well looked over.  
> Not brit-picked but (somewhat) researched. (Please tell me of any mistakes, I will correct them immediately.) 
> 
> The story starts out with John and Sherlock having been estranged from each other for a period of time, during which Sherlock may (or may not) have relapsed. John is not married but about five years have passed since Reichenbach. There are wounds that still need to be healed and apologies yet to be made. 
> 
> This is my first attempt at writing in over five years, so please bear with me on this journey. Thanks for reading!

There was something nagging at the edge of Sherlock's consciousness, a twinge of recognition that spiked his interest. Like a spring he snapped, jolting forward from his chair, long limbs clambering for purchase on any surface they could find. The knowledge that he’d seen something important, yet was too fogged-in with fatigue to comprehend it fully bothered him. He flinched, blinked rapidly, attempting to clear his vision. What had he seen?

 

Reaching forward with long fingers he flicked at a bit of dust blocking his path to the window. It skittered and swirled away, taking with it the friendly particles of its kin. Long streaks of afternoon sun sliced the floorboards beneath his bare feet and he stepped into them, like a cat luxuriating in its warmth. His pale skin blazed acid white under the rays and he blinked once more, distracted by the contrast. Why was he here? What had he seen?

 

The window.

 

Something outside the window.

 

 _Look down_.

 

Bracing himself with both arms, stretched long and wide on the mold surround, he leaned on the warbled glass, absorbing the chill of early winter that clung to the panes like ice to a tree limb. Rubbing the ridge of his nose along the cold surface to ground himself, he focused his gaze to the street below, and saw what he had already known was there, what he had sensed moments, minutes, hours, days before - John Watson, staring up at the second story window of 221B.

 

 _John_.

 

John Watson had come home.

 

Seventeen steps were swallowed by his large feet, three strides to the door, two inhaled breaths of stagnant air, and one grand swing of the black slap allowed the white light of the street to pour into the dark parlour, bringing with it the silhouette of the man he knew to be his friend.

 

John.

 

He remained stock still on the doorstep, a dark image against a blinding light that stung at the edges of Sherlock’s eyes. He stared until they watered and he had to blink away the sting, rubbing his hands frantically over his face. He pinched the bridge of his nose, gulped in air and refocused. John was still there. In fact, John had come closer; John was inside the threshold and he was reaching a hand out to Sherlock. He flinched at the sight and step back, his shame overtaking him. It was a mere fraction of a second, an instinct he despised, but it worked like a cascade of ice over John's tentative actions. Why had he flinched, he wondered? What was he ashamed of? Scared of? 

 

John Watson wasn’t there to judge him or hurt him. Was he? No. John was John. His John. His rock, his comfortable chair and worn in jumpers, and endless cups of strong, black tea, and a good scotch at the end of a long week, and a warm fire, and bare feet with perfectly clipped toenails to go along with his perfectly kept bed - hospital corners all. John was perfect, not danger. And yet Sherlock had flinched, and John saw it, and his hand dropped like a lead balloon, balling into a fist at his side.

 

“No.”

 

Sherlock hadn’t realized that the destroyed, cracked voice was his until John’s face crumbled from frustrated caution to outright concern. His eyes went slightly wild as he stepped forward, wanting to reach out but was too hesitant, too nervous to spook the distressed, broken racehorse of a man in front of him. It went against everything Sherlock knew of John's character and he hated that he'd made him react in such a way. 

 

“I’m not going to hurt you, Sherlock.”

 

“No.”

 

No, of course not. John wouldn’t hurt him. Would he? No, he wouldn’t. He’s John. Perfect John. Hospital corners and good scotch, John.

 

“No, I . . . I’m sorry.”

 

“Christ, Sherlock. You need help.”

 

Holding his head in his hands, attempting to force the piercing, roaring train of a headache that came along with John’s words, Sherlock shook violently in the tiny stairwell, attempting to rid himself of all his pain.

 

“No! No, no, no, no, no!”

 

“Sherlock!”

 

His head shot up, eyes wide, then narrow. John was there. John, in his house. Back home. _John._ He reached out, determined to make him stay. Make him _see_! 

 

“John.”

 

“Yes. I’m here. And you need help.”

 

“No, I need you, John.”

 

“I can’t help you, Sherlock. This is beyond me.”

 

“No, it isn’t.”

 

“Yes, it is, dammit!.”

 

“No! John. Listen.”

 

Sherlock held his hands up, but neither of them would be calmed. They had been through too much, pushed too hard against each other over the years, and now nothing but raw, battle-weary edges remained of their paired souls. Puffs of air misted in front of them as if they were greyhounds waiting to be set free at the gate.

 

“It’s not me that’s doing this John, it’s a . . . “ he hesitated. The word he was about to use was absurd, archaic, overused, and childish, and he hated both its limitations of explanation, and the stigma it carried.

 

John shifted his posture, blinked and took a step forward. Sherlock knew that he patience was wearing thin and anger would soon bubble up over the surface. He had to act.

 

“It’s a spell, John.”

 

John didn’t respond, be barely reacted. He just stood there, licked his lips once, shifted his weight to steady his feet and sighed. Finally, he dropped his head to his chest and shook it back and forth.

 

“Fuck this, Sherlock. I can’t do this, again.”

 

He turned to leave, but Sherlock’s brain had surged to the foreground of the fog and mentally jumped ahead of his friend. He flung his body across the threshold, his dressing gown swirling with him, seemingly growing in size until it engulfed the entire front stairwell and cocooned them both in midnight silk.

 

John took precious seconds to adjust to the darkness that now surrounded him and then promptly whispered in a warning tone that would terrify anyone who was sane, “Sherlock, what are you doing?”

 

“Explaining to you what’s wrong.”

 

He snapped his fingers and pinpricks of starlight appeared above them, the silk of his dressing gown now acting as an artificial night sky, illuminating Sherlock’s too-pale skin in a eerie purple glow that only served to enhance his sunken cheeks and wild eyes.

 

“I’m not doing this to myself, John. I promise. I’m being drugged by an outside force that I can not stop, and I need your help.”

 

_I need your help._

John had heard those words before. He had scoffed at them then, and he was about to scoff at them now, but before he could even flare his nostrils with indignation his feet lifted off the ground and he was suddenly levitating in Mrs. Hudson’s entryway.

 

“What the bloody hell is-”

 

“Look what’s happening to you, John! Really see it. You’re no longer touching the ground.”

 

“Yeah, I picked up on that one, you twat!”

 

“I’m not doing this, John. Well, I am a little, but it’s not just me, it’s what’s inside me! It’s what’s drugging me. It’s chemical and at the same time, magical, and I can’t stop it. I didn’t mean for it to happen but it’s fogging my mind too much for me to even attempt to think of a way to fix it. I need your help. I need your _mind_ , John.”

 

Momentarily startled out of his anger by the phrase, _I need your mind_ , John stared open-mouthed at the man before him, wondering if he’d somehow finally cracked and was now lost in his own personal version of hell, with Sherlock there to torture him for all eternity.

 

Two large hands gently framed John’s face with the lightest of touches, bringing his thoughts back to the present. Sherlock’s hands were shaking.

 

“When you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

 

“In this instance, that doesn’t make sense.”

 

Sighing, Sherlock looked away. “Right.”

 

“What now?”

 

“Does that mean you’ll help me?”

 

“That means, what is your rubbish plan, Sherlock?”

 

“I could use a cup of tea.”

 

Rearing, John threw his body backward, tearing free of Sherlock’s grasp. “You cock!”

 

Confusion colored Sherlock’s features, “What? I really could use a cup of tea.”

 

“Christ, how did I ever get here. Fine. Fine! How the bloody hell do I get out of his fabric prison?”

 

Sherlock looked crestfallen but closed his eyes, his hands steepling beneath his chin as vibrations spiked the air around them. John felt the deep resonating sound of a cello inside the marrow of his bones and reached out a hand to the only solid, tangible thing in sight: Sherlock. He held on for dear life. In a blink, the night sky above them was swiped away for the dull afternoon glow of Mrs. Hudson’s perfectly normal, non-magical stairwell.

 

Gasping John stepped back, mind reeling with the overstimulation of what had just happened. Not wanting to dwell or look over at the madman beside him, he turned on his boot heel and marched up stairs will all the determination of a starved foxhound during a field hunt. A strong cuppa was most definitely in order.

 

“Boys?”

 

“Hello Mrs. Hudson,” John boomed from the landing.

 

“Oh, how lovely. Sherlock, has he come to help?”

 

“No!” John shouted as Sherlock grinned with pride.

 

“Don’t let me interrupt, dear. I just popped out to see what all that noise was.”

 

“Magic, Mrs. Hudson.”

 

“Of course, dear.”With a click, the door to her flat closed and Sherlock turned his face towards the sound of the electric kettle heating. Some chink in the puzzle of his life had shifted back into place with John’s reappearance. It soothed the thunder cloud in Sherlock’s mind to a grey sky, and sent an echo of relief through his ravaged nerves.

 

At peace with how John took that first bit of news, Sherlock rallied. He shook out his hair with a swish of his hands, straightened his silk robe, raised up to his full height and took the stairs two at a time. After all, it wouldn’t do well to be late for tea.


	2. Chapter 2

_It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live_ , Sherlock read with a huff of disdain. What did this Rowling person know anyway? He slammed the children’s book shut and shoved it under the couch as he curled into a tight ball. His dreams had been filled with a myriad of soothing and wonderful scenarios that he very much liked to dwell on, thank you very much. It was a better alternative to opening his eyes and staring out at John's empty chair with its lonely Union Jack pillow across from him. The cold, cast iron grate of the hearth lay just beyond, mocking him with its black void of extinguished coals.

 

Where on earth was Mrs. Hudson when one needed kindling?

 

“Yoohoo!”

 

Sherlock smiled. Even in his addled state, he could predict that his ever loyal landlady would arrive at the exact moment he had need of her.

 

“I thought you could use a spot of tea, dear. And perhaps I’ll start up a fire? It’s rather cold in here.”

 

“Mrs. Hudson, you are a vision.”

 

“Oh, well. Alright.” Slightly pink in the neck, she tutted over to the fireplace and set herself to task. Sherlock rolled over and curled up tighter, his abdomen seizing with some sort of horrid decry of need. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten but surely it hadn’t been long enough to warrant these internal theatrics?

 

Why did John have to leave? Insufferable _responsibilities_! Why did adults go around all day worrying about such things? It was tedious.

 

He hadn't bothered listening to where John said he was going or what he was doing, he only clued into the fact that he said he'd return, and Sherlock soothed himself with that knowledge. John would come back and he would fill the emptiness inside the flat with his warmth once more - the puzzle piece finding its match. Until then, Sherlock would cling to the cup he had drank from with an iron grip, absorbing any residual heat John’s hands had left on the surface.

 

John brought a fire into the house that would never need kindling. He _was_ heat. It flowed out of him in a solid, stoic perpetual warmth that Sherlock knew was unique to John alone because it was only present when he was near. Sherlock could warm himself for eternity from that heat, and in a deep, selfish, all-encompassing way, he wanted to, but instead of that perfectly warm feeling he longed to covet, all he had was a coffee mug. He ran his thumb over the crest of the Royal Army Medical Corps in vain, knowing the paint of the seal had long been worn down to a thin film, imperceptible by touch. The fact that it was there, and that it belonged to John, still helped him to sooth his keyed-up nerves. He repeated the Latin words over and over, like a mantra - _In Arduis Fidelis_. _In Arduis Fidelis._ Faithful in adversity.

 

Yes, faithful. John was always there when Sherlock needed him.

 

He’d come back.

 

He had to come back.

 

Mrs. Hudson had been saying something obvious and motherly over his shoulder, nudging him with increasing force. He growled into the seat cushion before turning his neck enough to pop open one eye and glare at her for all his worth.

 

“Your tea is getting cold. Stop sulking. He’ll be back soon.”

 

She left the room then, just as quickly as she’d entered and Sherlock turned round fully to look at the dainty silver tea tray Mrs. Hudson had left on the jumbled mess of a coffee table. His skull was sitting in the middle of the service, staring blankly at him, mocking.

 

“Oh shut up.”

 

He reached forward for his tea to take a greedy sip while clutching John’s mug in his opposite hand. Not that Sherlock would admit to this out loud, but Mrs. Hudson was uncanny with her presentation. She had give him tea with two scoops of sugar and milk, perfectly sweet, and scones with what was undoubtedly freshly made clotted cream. His stomached lurched with joy at the thought and he sighed, hating that he was giving into such a boringly human thing as hunger.

 

His magnifying glass was also present on the tray, leaning next to Basil, the skull.

 

Why the magnifying glass?

 

He put down the scone plate, and instead picked up the instrument, starring, assessing, taking in all the data he could collect from such a familiar object.

 

“Why are you here?”

 

Pain lanced through him, blazing across his vision and sending him reeling. He fell back against the sofa cushions, John’s mug falling to the floor in what should have been a shattered smack of ceramic on wood. As if in slow motion, he prepared for the impact, the horror filled his mind even as it railed against him for placing such sentimentality on an inanimate thing. But when he thought the sound of cracking should disturb the air, all he heard was the thud of solid weight hitting fabric. He turned and looked down, past the edge of the seat towards the floorboards. There, cushioned in folds of his silk dressing gown was John’s mug, safe and solid.

 

The vibrations caught up with him a fraction of a second later. They are what had caused the spike of pain in the first place. He looked about the room, the edges of his vision swimming with the blurred images of the flat. He felt as if his face has been shoved inside a bass speaker with the volume turned up to eleven, but there was no sound, only the aftermath: the bone-deep rattling vibration. It made everything itch and shake and spin around him and he wanted to scream from the overwhelming slam of data it provoked. He couldn’t take it all in, he couldn’t control it, or even categorize it into neat little piles of one sentence pages to be sorted through at a later time. Collapsing on the ground in front of the couch, he grabbed for the book he’d been reading earlier.

 

He’d force himself to focus on the simple, soothing prose of the children’s story he’d become engrossed in that morning. Each word, each letter he’d take in with painful, slow acceptance. After he’d finish each sentence, he would take a breath, hold it deep and release. It had worked this morning after an episode had overtaken him and it would work now. He’d make it fucking work.

 

“What the . . . Sherlock?”

 

Jumping up from his prone position on the floor, he bumped the coffee table, and Basil went rolling off the tea tray, careening towards the fireplace with increasing speed. Sherlock watched with interest as the decidedly not-round object defied the laws of physics by overcoming such inertia with ease.

 

“How?”

 

His question was cut off the next second as Basil reached the flames and rolled upwards, against gravity, into them.

 

Both John and Sherlock stepped forward, their arms reaching out in mirrored acts of surprise.

 

A bright burst of violet light engulfed the room as Basil preformed another feat of anti-gravity by rising above the flames and out of the grate to hover at what appeared to be exactly five feet, nine inches above the ground. Behind Basil, reflected in the mirror floated the unsettling half image of a stovepipe hat and long, ginger hair tied neatly into a tail with a silk ribbon. The apparition could have been brought on by the mirage effect of the fire and its rippling of the air as heat rose out of the hearth into the room, but Sherlock had long stopped trying to find answers to impossible things. His brain supplied the truth for him, he was seeing the ghostly presence of the man whose skull had kept vigil on his mantel for the last five years.

 

Before he could swallow back the slight panic that was rising within him, Basil opened his jaws to speak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, that's a shitty spot to leave it, but I have to flesh out Basil (so to speak) and I wanted to put this up for people to read while that happens. I'm laying out a storyline as I post this chapter. It looks like Mrs. Hudson may be more than just their loving landlady. I always like when she has things to do other than make tea and hoover the carpets.
> 
> Also, does anyone know how long in the TV canon that Sherlock has lived at 221B? I wrote five years but I don't know if that's right. They must have it on Sherlockology somewhere. . .


	3. Chapter 3

He heard John curse under his breath and stepped towards him. He wanted to reach out a hand as he shifted ever closer to his friend, but held back. He knew John wasn’t the clingy type. 

 

“What year is it?” 

 

Both John and Sherlock starred in awe at the echo of a sound that came from Basil’s non-throat. It was then that Sherlock realized something and picked up the magnifying glass from the coffee table. Mrs. Hudson had left it there on purpose, and no doubt, for this reason. It wasn’t a guess, it was fact. After all, Sherlock never guessed, it was a shocking habit that was destructive to the logical faculty of his mind. 

 

With delicate fingers he raised the small glass in front of his eyes - it revealed the true, corporeal form of Basil beyond just that of his skull. Despite the jarring effect it had on Sherlock’s senses of seeing something through a glass that shouldn’t reveal anything beyond a closer image of what it focused on (a hovering skull and _ not _ a human shape) he narrowed his eyes and took in what he could. Vibrations were humming at the base of his neck, he knew his time to collect data might be cut short any second. 

 

Basil’s dress was all wrong, not belonging to a single decade or time period but a myriad of them. Sherlock squinted harder, bringing the glass closer to his face, cataloging all he saw. The boots were scuffed, worn in, but shone as if they’d recently been polished - circa 1910. The jacket was finely cut, tailored even, and fit the man with a delicate ease, it was no doubt his favorite coat, and of Regency style. The button down shirt beneath looked modern, with a checked pattern and a tiny stain of bacon grease. Whenever Basil had succumb to his last breath, it was after the man had had a hearty breakfast. 

 

“I really don’t like repeating myself,” Basil said, interrupting Sherlock’s assessments. 

 

“2016,” he supplied. There was a bit of sting to his tone, feeling rudely shaken from his observations.  _ Why was Basil, an aristocratic englishman, wearing a kilt from the 16th century?  _

 

Through the glass, Basil’s eyes widened and shock grew evident on his thin, pale face. John saw none of this however, and closed the distance between him and Sherlock, having correctly assumed that the glass was somehow revealing more of Basil than what was immediately evident. 

 

“Extraordinary,” he said, spying a peak over Sherlock’s left arm. 

 

“Yes, quite.” Sherlock snapped the glass closed and refocused on the hovering skull before him. He’d captured a perfect mental image of the man behind the glass to be unpacked and studied later. A slight tremor shot through his right arm, and Sherlock noted the vibrations growing in strength, sliding down his spine like melting snow sneaking past the upturned collar of his coat. 

Shivering, Sherlock stepped back, needing to sit down before his legs gave out. John, seeing Sherlock’s distress backed up with him to the sofa, sitting next to him, ready for whatever was to follow. 

 

“The vibrations are beyond distracting, aren’t they?” 

 

Sherlock’s eyes snapped back to Basil, narrowing. “You know what’s happening to me?”

 

“Of course, I do. I’m inside your head.” 

 

Eyes widening, Sherlock turned to his left, needing to see John, needing to know that John was hearing this along with him, that he wasn’t making this up, that this wasn’t a nightmare he couldn’t wake from. 

 

“You can hear him, can’t you? Tell me!” 

 

“Yes! Yes, I can hear him, Sherlock.” 

 

Sighing with relief, Sherlock buried his face in his hands, the vibrations overwhelming him once more. He tried to focus on his breathing, forcing it to be steady, but he was failing. 

 

“They won’t stop. It’s pointless to try.” Basil’s tone wasn’t teasing but sympathetic. 

 

“Shut. Up!” 

 

“Do you really want that? I can answer your questions. I know what’s happening to you.” 

 

John, who had been rubbing circles into Sherlock’s back looked up at the skull, his eyes intense. 

 

“Fine, please tell us what the fuck is happening.” 

 

“Language.” 

 

Standing from the couch, he rounded on the skull before the hearth, plucking it out of the air with both hands. It seared and burned his skin, but John held tight, staring into the black empty orbs where he knew Basil’s eyes were looking back, daring him to retreat. Behind them in the mirror, Basil’s hat had fallen off and his red hair had been shaken free of its loose ribbon, flowing out over John’s hands. 

 

John looked back and forth between the oddity of the stagnant skull, and the scene playing out in the mirror behind him and decided to turn the tables. He whipped the skull around, facing the mirror above the hearth and saw for the first time, Basil’s true face. Wide, light-colored eyes flared with anger as John held his head firm, the smell of charred skin stinging his nose and making his nostrils flare. 

 

“I’m burning you,” Basil seethed. 

 

“It doesn’t matter. None of this is real.” 

 

“How do you know this isn’t real?” Basil’s eyes widened further, his hair now floating unnaturally around his head, creating a mane of red gold that encircled John’s fingers. 

 

“You said you’re in Sherlock’s head.” 

 

“And what makes you think that this can’t be real, even if it’s happening inside his head?” 

 

John didn’t know how to respond to that, so he waited, his arms straining from the effort of holding onto the skull that was now vibrating violently in his grip. 

 

“John,” Sherlock warned. “John, step back.” 

 

John couldn’t step back, he was rooted to the spot. Smoke was rising from his hands, twisting around Basil’s hair in a sick surreal dance that John prayed beyond hope wasn’t actually happening. The pain he was feeling was acute, shooting deep spikes of heat into the bones of his fingers. John was accustomed to withstanding pain, and did not shrink back. His mind couldn’t create such a vivid sensation as this, it was so far beyond a psychosomatic limp that he knew it had to be real on some level. In a room full of unanswered questions he’d hold onto the comfort of that knowledge, consequences be damned. 

 

Basil’s eyes were closed, the strain of the vibrations evident in his expresion. He tried to speak several times, but couldn’t. John was starting to feel faint and itched all over. He wanted to scratch at his clothes, tear them apart and dig under his skin to rid himself of the itch that hovered there, but he couldn’t move. 

 

“I’m not the enemy,” Basil said. 

 

“Then let me go,” John seethed. “Let Sherlock go.” 

 

“I’m only the messenger.” 

 

“John.” Sherlock’s voice cracked behind him and John looked past Basil’s reflection to the sofa beyond and saw Sherlock lilting to the side, floating slowly down to the cushions, his eyes rolling to the back of his head. 

 

“No!” John tried to turn towards him but his body was frozen in place. He glared at Basil in the mirror, anger spiking. “Let. Me. Go.” 

 

“Have a cup of tea, John. It will soothe your pain.” 

 

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

 

“It means I want to help.” 

 

“Yeah, well, forgive me if I think that’s a load of bollocks.” 

 

“Again with such language. Breathe deeply, I’ll be gone soon. The fire’s almost out. Keep it lit.” 

 

“Why?” 

 

“It’s how this works. Keep the fire lit, John. Warmth is important to him.” 

 

John blinked once, twice, and his world shifted. The room snapped from the dark violet glow that had engulfed it to the shadowed, lazy light of early evening, dim but thankfully normal. He dropped the skull from his hands as soon as his body allowed, and it floated back towards the mantel, settling itself next to pile of inquiries stabbed through with Sherlock’s Bowie knife. His hands were raw, seared but not beyond repair. In fact, the burns looked superficial, as if he’d grabbed hold of the skillet without wrapping it in a cloth first, and quickly pulled back after realizing his error. He’d need a cold compress and bandage or two, but nothing more. Well, a glass of scotch wouldn’t hurt. 

 

Behind him he heard Sherlock groan and he turned, making it to his friend’s side in three long strides. 

 

“Paper.” 

 

“What?” 

 

“Paper, John. I need paper!” Sherlock’s eyes were closed and his brows furrowed. He was agitated and clutching at his abdomen in what looked like pain but still managed to be demanding as ever. 

 

Looking about, John overturned a piece of mail off the table and pushed into sherlock’s hands. His eyes snapped open and he sat upright, shoving away the brick-a-brack in front of him and picked up the pen resting on the silver tea tray. 

 

“Mrs. Hudson, you minx,” he said, turning the pen over in his grasp, amused at her foresight and itching with the need to question her.  _ How did she know? _

 

Turning back to the paper, he quickly sketched out the shape of a man, and then went back over the light form to fill in the details. Stove pipe hat, long nose, longer hair, Regency jacket, modern shirt, pocket square, pocket watch, fountain pen, traditionally folded kilt hanging low down the backs of his legs, turn-of-the-century boots, indents present on the internal ledge of the heels - Basil rode a horse, and often. A man whose main mode of transportation was horseback and yet he wore a modern dress shirt? What a delicious conundrum. 

 

“Sherlock.” 

 

“Mmm?”

 

“You realize you’ve been sketching for the better part of an hour?” 

 

Looking up, he saw John, hands wrapped in loose bandages, holding his RAMC mug. It wasn’t filled with tea, Sherlock noted. John sipped with a raised eyebrow, his expresion speaking volumes. 

 

“Have I been talking to myself?” 

 

“Yes.” 

 

“What did I say?” 

 

“A number of things. Basil isn’t a cowboy, apparently. Good deduction, that.” 

 

As opposed to snapping back with a ‘shut up’ or something more biting, Sherlock instead smiled, throwing John for a loop. 

 

“You’re smiling.” 

 

“I know.” 

 

“Why?” 

 

“Because you’re home, John.” Contentment flowed over Sherlock like a warm blanket and he closed his eyes and leaned back, curling his legs up toward his chest as he shifted and snuggled deep into the sofa cushions. A nap seemed like the perfect thing to do at that moment. 

 

“I’m not home, Sherlock. This isn’t home anymore.” 

 

“Yes, it is, John. It’ll always be home if you’re here.” 

 

Succumbing to his exhaustion, Sherlock buried his nose under a pillow and allowed sleep to take him. He’d dream of John and their old adventures and all would be well again, even with the slight, ticklish vibrations humming along his spine. 

  
  
  


John, finding Sherlock’s behavior to be odd at the best of times, took his ramblings with a grain of salt. The man was a mess, and despite there being no immediate evidence of chemical substances existing within the walls of 221B, John didn’t put it past Sherlock to lie through his teeth about his drug habits. He placed the mug on the coffee table and went off to search the flat once more. 

 

Had Sherlock been telling the truth earlier about spells and his mind magicking itself into a drug-addled fog? John’s patience when it came to addicts wasn’t very long to begin with, and Sherlock had been given second and third and fourth chances already. But between the stairwell incident earlier in the day and what had just happened with the skull, his burned hands being true evidence to that effect, John couldn’t brush this situation aside. There was too much he couldn’t deny any longer.  

 

_ … Whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. _

 

In his wanderings about the flat, John had found himself upstairs in his old room. The bed remained as he had left it; the hospital corners loudly punctuating the empty space with their crisp precision. It was the only part of the room that spoke of him having spent any time there at all. His other belongings had been removed years ago when he had moved, and yet, Mrs. Hudson had never let out the room to someone else. And after Sherlock had returned, he never bothered to find a new roommate, not that anyone in their right mind would choose to live with the man. 

 

Anyone except him. 

 

“You really have lost it, haven’t you, Watson? And now you’re talking to yourself. Brilliant.” 

 

Fatigue struck him like a battering ram. He staggered under its weight, and walked towards the finely made bed without a second thought. Yes, a nap was a good idea. Why hadn’t he thought of that sooner? Falling face forward onto the soft mattress, he collapsed with ease, not fighting the wrongness he felt prickle at the back of his neck. Once his body had cocooned itself in the warmth of his old bed, however, he lost all urgency to figure out what wasn’t quite right and allowed the idea of a good sleep to wash over him. Yes, sleep was what he needed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh, what's happening? They can't possibly both be tired at the same time during the middle of the day, can they?  
> This story can go in about three different directions after this point. I have no idea which will win out, but if y'all have suggestions, please feel free to leave them. 
> 
> I'm off to walk the dog.


	4. Chapter 4

There was a strange feeling at the back of John’s neck, like the feather-light touch of a mosquito landing on one’s skin before the itch sets in. He swiped at the spot but it didn’t help, there was no bug to smash, only the lingering nag of something present where it shouldn’t be. Frustration setting in, he rolled onto his back, and stared at the ceiling. How did he get here? This wasn’t his bedroom. Or, at least, it wasn’t his current bedroom. Feeling a shift beside him, he instinctively flung himself off the bed, landing on the floor in a heap only to pop his head back over the side a moment later. 

 

“Sherlock!” 

 

“Hmm. Sleeping.” 

 

“Get up!” 

 

What the hell was he doing in John’s bed?  _ Your old bed _ , he reminded himself. How had he gotten there, and why did he steal all the pillows? No wonder his neck felt strange. 

 

Sherlock’s curly head was all that could be seen under the down duvet, and his lack of response or movement to John’s command only spurred him on, but before he could start rattling the bedposts or fling the covers off of the madman, he was interrupted. 

 

“Yes, you should get up. There’s so much to do.” 

 

John turned towards the sound to find Basil, standing behind him, fully formed and looking extremely real in a very unsettling way. 

 

“How are you doing that?”  

 

“Doing what?” Basil had the audacity to look contrite at the question. “I’m helping. I told you I’d help.” 

 

“Yes, but how are you standing there?”

 

Sighing with a sense of the dramatic that even Sherlock would appreciate, Basil stepped through the doorway into John’s bedroom, bringing with him a chill that John begrudgingly associated with ghost stories. John hadn’t thought ghosts were real until this afternoon. Then again, John also hadn’t thought that magic was real until Sherlock’s dressing gown decided to turn Mrs. Hudson’s stairwell into something out of a fantasy children’s book, complete with a starry nighttime sky. 

 

_ Christ, I really am losing it, _ he thought. 

 

He scrubbed his face with his hands, and pushed his hair back off his forehead, removing the strands that had been tickling his eyebrows and poking at his temper. John disliked when his hair wasn’t in order. He didn’t like being rudely woken up by his friend’s boney bum nestling along his hip either. He rubbed at his bruised knee at the memory. No, he didn’t like that at all, and why on earth was Basil suddenly able to walk around on two feet without John needing the help of a looking glass to see him? There were too many unanswered questions, and Sherlock, who could no doubt answer a few of them, was still bloody sleeping. 

 

“Sherlock!” John boomed. 

 

“He’ll be awake soon, John, don’t worry. Now, I don’t have much time, you need to listen.”

 

“I can’t begin to tell you how much I want to break your nose right now.” 

 

“You should figure out where all that anger is coming from, John. It’s not good for your health.” 

 

John laughed. It was a bitter sound. “I’m a doctor. I know how to take care of myself.” 

 

Basil shot John a raised eyebrow, but didn’t dwell on the subject. Instead he moved towards the bed with hands raised as if he were about to conduct a symphony. John watched as Basil somehow made the quilts slid away of their own accord and for Sherlock’s prone form to rise up into the air, still very much asleep. His hair floated out around his head, creating a dark curled halo as his dressing gown ghosted up out behind him, mimicking the billowing of his coat tails. He looked as if he were suspended in water, a drowning man slipping into oblivion with a look of utter peace resting on his face. John’s throat closed up at the sight and he felt himself swallow, attempting to push away the feeling. 

 

“Sherrrrlock,” Basil sang. “Sherrrrr-lock.” 

 

Dreamy eyelids opened slowly revealing eyes void of Sherlock’s normal sharpness. There was no spark inside those drowsy, ever-changing eyes, only haze. It disturbed John, and he moved forward, the need to help his friend acute and painfully present. 

 

“Don’t touch him, John. You’ll startle him.”

 

“I don’t know what’s happening.” 

 

“Look.” 

 

“I am, dammit!” 

 

“What do you see?” 

 

John stepped back with a sigh, and planted his feet, eyes snapped from Basil (who he was really starting to hate) to Sherlock’s form floating eerily in front of them. Yes, his eyes were open but they were also darting about the room in every direction, not focusing on anything in particular. 

 

_ R.E.M. cycle.  _ Sherlock was dreaming. 

 

Basil, noting that John had caught on, dropped his one arm and twisted his wrist. Across from them, they saw the result in Sherlock’s body as he careened backward in pain, only to flail forward and grab his abdomen as he curled into a fetal position in the air, his eyes never not stopping their sickening dance. 

 

“No!” John stepped towards Basil, warning clear in his tone. Basil smiled and moved his hand upwards with Sherlock's body following suit, relaxing into his previous calm. 

 

“Don’t worry, he won’t remember. I’m here to help.” 

 

“You keep saying that.” 

 

“And I mean it. What do you think I’m doing here?”

 

“Causing my friend pain.” 

 

“No, that’s not what I’m doing. I was merely demonstrating that we have a special opportunity here. We need to figure out how Sherlock’s mind has created this magic , and this lucid dream is going to allow to research that mystery.” 

 

“Lucid dream.” 

 

“Yes, John. What makes you think that I can actually walk around in my corporeal form like this?”

 

“I’m dreaming?” 

 

Basil smiled and nodded once, a small, resigned look of sympathy on his face. 

 

“Yes, you are. So I wouldn’t go yelling at Sherlock for stealing the pillows. You, after all, made him do that. You dreamed him here.” 

 

Stepping back in confusion, John shook his head, wanting to clear it of this nonsense. He ran out the door of his bedroom and flung himself down the stairs to the sitting room where Sherlock had been sleeping earlier. John knew what he was going to find there before he even rounded the corner into the room, and hated that he’d been right. There was Sherlock, still curled up in an impossibly small ball on the sofa, his nose buried beneath a pillow, asleep and sound. 

 

“Christ!” John cursed and turned on his heel to run back up the stairs to his room. 

 

“You’re in Sherlock’s mind?” 

 

Basil smiled. “Very good.” 

 

“He’s doing this?” 

 

“No, John. He’s allowing this, there’s a difference. You’re actually the one who’s called me up here to help. You figured out on a subconscious level that Sherlock somehow created this magic and that figuring out where it was coming from in his head was a good place to start.” 

 

“You can’t create magic.” It was a statement that John wished so deeply to be true. 

 

“Why not?”

 

“I don’t know, because it doesn’t bloody exist!” Grabbing control of himself, John turned in a circle, planted his feet once more and made up his mind. “Fine, I’m sorry. Pretend I didn’t yell that. It would seem that magic does exist. So what do we do now?” 

 

“We think.” 

 

“Christ, you’re just like him.” 

 

Basil raised another eyebrow. John didn’t need to hear him speak to know that he was thinking,  _ obvious _ with a superior amount of disdain. 

 

“He said it was a spell. This morning in the stairwell. He said a spell was doing this to him.” 

 

Basil nodded. 

 

“So did he . . . conjure it himself, or did someone do it to him?” 

 

“You’re asking the right questions.” 

 

John shot Basil a look. “And you’re not answering any of them.” 

 

“Am I supposed to?” 

 

“Yes! Dammit.” 

 

Basil merely smiled and went to perch himself on the end of the bed, playing with the edge of Sherlock’s eerily floating dressing gown. To John’s shock, it seemed as if the fabric was caressing him back, as if it were actually a cat and not a bit of inanimate silk. 

 

“Could this be for a case? I haven’t been in touch with him in months, but when he goes off the deep end it’s for a case. The higher the stakes, the more likely it is for him to lose himself.” 

 

John was pacing, gathering all the data he could muster from his conversation with Sherlock earlier that afternoon. Had it really only been a few hours since he'd walked back through the door of 221B - only a few hours since his life had once again been thrown into a topsy turvy jumble of a mess thanks to Sherlock? He felt light on his feet, his legs ready for action as he paced, and his pulse was accelerated, pumping a notch or two higher than its normal rate. His body hummed; he hadn't felt this way in ages and he hated himself for liking it, for craving it.  His acceptance of that fact didn't change that he was currently being held captive by not only his own subconscious but Sherlock's impossible mind and he had to figure out how to move forward in the game. 

 

“Where would he find a magic spell in London? There’s plenty of novelty shops and children’s tricks, but a real spell, with real magic. Where do you even start to look?” John ran his hand through his hair again, concentrating. 

 

“You’re going to wear down those floorboards at this rate.” 

 

John looked over just in time to see Basil yawn. The damn thing actually had the audacity to yawn at him. 

 

“You’re not helping.” 

 

“Oh right, I’m supposed to be doing that aren’t I?” Basil jumped up, his kilt swishing about his legs. John noticed that his stovepipe hat was missing and his hair was still undone from earlier. 

 

“How’s your head? Are you burned at all?” He held out his bandaged hand to show in sympathy. 

 

“Oh, John. How sweet you are.” Basil fluttered his eyelashes at him and John sighed. 

 

“Fine. Never mind. You’re going to help me now?” 

 

“Yes, I am.” 

 

“Great.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really like writing Basil.


	5. Chapter 5

“John, I need you to concentrate. You have Sherlock at your every disposal, so let’s not waste this opportunity.”

 

John nodded, but in truth, was rather confused. What did Basil mean, his every disposal? Sherlock was asleep, and deep in the middle of a dream from the looks of it - he couldn’t be roused even with the sound of cannon fire.

 

“You don’t understand.”

 

It hadn’t been posed as a question and John glared at the man, a terse smile curving at the corner of his mouth. John was not in a humorous mood, in fact, he was properly pissed off. His temper made the muscles of his face tighten with strain, causing him to practically grin with tension. To any other person (any other _living_ person) John’s expression would be downright terrifying, but to Basil, it was something to celebrate, because Basil saw it for what it was: it was John’s game face, and Basil loved the game.

 

“Sherlock is your plaything right now John. Do you not know what that means?”

 

“No, I don’t. And I don’t appreciate that language either. He’s not a damn toy poodle, he’s my friend.”

 

“Yes, yes. Very loyal of you. Focus, man. We don’t have much time.”

 

“You keep saying that and yet you aren’t helping!”

 

“Come here.”

 

John didn’t hesitate before stepping in front of Basil and raising himself to his full height which was still, begrudgingly, an inch and a half shorter than Basil’s.

 

“Alright. What’s the plan.”

 

“Manipulate your _friend_.” Basil spat the word as if it were a vile thing, and John quirked an eyebrow at him. What was wrong with Sherlock being his friend? Why was Basil having these reactions? Wasn’t he just a picture-perfect memory of the skull-man from the mantel that Sherlock had animated with his subconscious? In fact, wasn’t this just Sherlock talking to John by proxy?

 

 _Too many questions._ . .

 

Basil grew tired of watching John’s mind work and instead, bodily moved him to stand directly in front of Sherlock’s floating form. He then raised his arm to shoulder height and watched Sherlock in turn lift his chin. John, sensing the pattern, raised his other arm and wound his hand in a circle, making Sherlock turn mid air before them.

 

“I can control him?”

 

“Yes. When he can see you. You have to stand in front of him.”

 

John wondered why this particular direction was necessary, but didn’t say anything. That didn’t stop Basil from answering his question anyway. “He always wants to see you, John. Let him see you.”

 

Feeling uncomfortable with the amount of emotion in Basil’s voice, John changed the subject.

 

“How does this help me figure out where the magic came from?”

 

“Ask him, you terribly handsome, yet utterly thick git.”

 

John let that odd compliment/insult go and instead directed his attentions on the man before him.

 

“Sherlock?”

 

Sherlock’s eyebrow raised, as if he were actually listening, all the while his eyes still spun in endless circles. John kept focused on the curls of Sherlock’s hair falling in waves across his forehead, the sight of his dreaming, fast-moving eyes causing him pangs of nausea each time he foolishly looked down to see them.

 

“Can you tell me who did this to you?”

 

As if he were moving through molasses, Sherlock shook his head back in forth, his hair swishing in slow-motion about his head. John hated the sight of Sherlock so vulnerable, but pushed on, hoping to ask the right question.

 

“Where did you find the spell?”

 

“I didn’t find it, it found me.” It was the first time Sherlock had spoken and his voice echoed throughout the room in warbled, vibrating baritone. John felt the sound resonate inside his very bones and he had to bend at the waist and brace his hands on his knees to keep from falling. The feeling it provoked within him was so potent it was heady. It reminded John of the overwhelming desert heat of his past that had permeated every layer of his skin and clung to his clothes, refusing him any solace. He hated the memory but craved the feeling because it meant that he was alive. A living, breathing, fucking, Hemingway of a man who inhaled danger and exhaled the consequences on a beautiful, bitter wind of laughter. 

 

“Christ, that’s. . . “

 

“It affects you because he wants it to,” Basil supplied.

 

“What?”

 

“You’re not the only one dreaming here,” Basil said, while pointing to Sherlock. “He knows your nearby, he can _see_ you, so he’s trying to impress you.”

 

“That’s insane. How is any of this possible?”

 

“Don’t waste your questions on me, little man. Talk to your _friend_.”

 

Again he spat the word out as if it were some nasty slur he didn’t want the flavor of on his tongue and John wondered why he rebelled against the idea so greatly. Sherlock's friendship was the most important of his life, it hurt to hear this figment refer to it with such ire in his tone.  

 

“Sherlock,” John said, turning back towards the bed, “so if the spell found you, can you tell me where it came from? Who created it?”

 

“Yes.” The ‘s’ hissed out throughout the room, and John thought that he better sit down before his legs gave out. The vibrations were staggering. Sherlock followed suit still floating above the bed, his knees bending as if he’d found purchase on the edge of an invisible chair while his dressing gown curled around him in a possessive embrace, making John smile, despite himself.

 

“Who, Sherlock?”

 

“Carl Powers.”

 

John frowned. Carl Powers had been dead for over two decades.

 

“He’s dead, Sherlock.”

 

“Yes, he is.”

 

John was just about to speak when Sherlock’s voice reverberated through his bones again, unprompted. “His father, however, isn’t.”

 

“Oh . . . oh! Right. Brilliant. Where is Carl Sr. now?”

 

When Sherlock spoke again, his voice still resonated deeply within John’s body, but now held a sing-song quality that was more disturbing then John would ever dare admit.

 

“ _I do not know, say the great Bells of Bow._

_Here comes a candle to light you to bed._

_Here comes a chopper to chop off your head._

_Chop, chop, chip, chop. The last man’s dead!_ ”

 

John turned to Basil. “A nursery rhyme?”

 

“ _Oranges and Lemons_ ,” Basil said, looking intrigued. He stepped closer to the bed, his eyes alight with wonder. “Of course.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“ _The great bells of Bow_. They were used to time the executions at Newgate prison.”

 

John thought back to his history lessons at school. “That place doesn’t exist anymore. They tore it down.”

 

The light in Basil’s eyes died a bit, and he looked at John, crestfallen.

 

“But, that’s where the Old Bailey is.”

 

Basil tilted his head in question, willing John to continue.

 

“The Central Criminal Court over on Old Bailey. It sits on the site of the demolished prison.”

 

“ _Bailey_ ,” Basil repeated with interest. “The fortified wall. . .”

 

“Yes. The old wall that used to define London’s border. And now it’s a street and a court where major criminal cases are heard.” That last bit struck John as odd because a high-stakes criminal case was Sherlock’s favorite thing. No wonder he was singing a nursery rhyme about it to him.

 

“That can’t be--”

 

“Now John,” Basil said, interrupting his thoughts. “What do we say about coincidence?”

 

“The universe is rarely so lazy.”

 

With a smile more sinister than Sherlock could even muster, Basil stepped away from John, his presence shrinking backward and simultaneously taking with him all the air in the room. John grabbed at his throat, his eyes widening in shock at the sudden lack of oxygen in his lungs.

 

“I think it’s time for you to wake up now, Doctor.”

 

In a rush of cold air and a swish of tartan, Basil surged forward, engulfing the room, the bed, the floorboards, everything until John was nothing but a spec of matter in a black void. He ceased to exist on any plane and felt the drag and pull of gravity clawing at his feet. Fighting back panic he kicked and screamed and thrashed until he was falling, falling endlessly through time until he connected with a solid smack against the hard wooden floorboards of his old bedroom in 221B.

 

John Watson, doctor, widow, and friend to Sherlock Holmes, the world’s only consulting detective, had had a bad dream, and fell from his bed in his sleep. He now lay, sprawled on the floor, his supraorbital ridge throbbing from where it made contact with the very solid oak beneath him. He raised his battered head, looked around at the dusty room and the darkening sky outside, and knew for the first time, in a very long time, what it felt like to once again be alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone is still reading, how are you liking it so far? 
> 
> The full text of Oranges and Lemons: 
> 
> "Oranges and lemons" say the bells of St. Clement's  
> "You owe me five farthings" say the bells of St. Martin's  
> "When will you pay me?" say the bells of Old Bailey  
> "When I grow rich" say the bells of Shoreditch  
> "When will that be?" say the bells of Stepney  
> "I do not know" say the great bells of Bow  
> "Here comes a candle to light you to bed  
> Here comes a chopper to chop off your head  
> Chip chop chip chop - the last man's dead."


	6. Chapter 6

"John . . . John!" 

 

Sherlock came bursting through the doorway, his face alight with eager anticipation.

 

“We have to go to the Old Bailey,” John said, beating Sherlock to the punch.

 

Sherlock’s face fell, looking all the world like a little boy at Christmas who didn’t get the pirate hat he had so desperately wanted. John held in the laugh he felt forming in his belly because it was a precious sight, even if the boy in question was actually a thirty five year-old posh git with an ego the size of Europe and not an innocent child. 

 

“How did you know what I was going to say, John?”

 

“Simple. I’m a genius.”

 

Sherlock frowned. “John, I do not wish to insult your worldly experience and practical knowledge but--”

 

“I was in your head, Sherlock. That dream you had just now with Basil and floating above the bed and your voice being some kind of super sonic vibration instrument? I was there. In the dream. Fully lucid.”  John said all this as he rubbed at his temples and shifted into a seated position.

 

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed in fascination as he started to pace. “How is this possible?”

 

“I don’t know.” John assumed that the sudden and strange magic that seemed to permeate 221B may be responsible for the surreal experience, but he was hoping Sherlock would be able to shed some solid, factual light on the situation.

 

“You were there. When I spoke to you, I was actually speaking to _you_?” Sherlock asked.

 

He gaze was piercing as he turned towards John and prowled the tiny room like a caged tiger. He seemed worried, almost uncertain, which was rare and terrifying for Sherlock. The man never repeated himself, especially to reiterate statements that had already been clarified. John noted a slight pink tinge to the tops of Sherlock’s sharp cheekbones, and a flush spreading across the base of his neck. It was an observation that John did not want to ignore but one he wasn't ready to spend time on either. 

 

He nodded in answer to Sherlock's question. “Yes. I could . . . control you, in a way.”

 

Sherlock’s left eyebrow shot up past his hairline. “Fascinating. Yes, I remember that.”

 

John shook his head. “No, it was weird. And creepy. Basil twisted his wrist and you were suddenly arching back in pain. It wasn’t something I enjoyed seeing or doing.”

 

“Really, John? I thought you’d prefer to be in charge of the types of amorous proceedings that generally occur behind closed doors.”  

 

John gave Sherlock a look and Sherlock grinned at him.

 

“First,” John deliberately held up his middle finger, “the door was and still is open, and second,” he added his index finger while turning his palm inward, “shut up.”

 

“As if you'd actually want me to stop talking.”

 

John shook his head back and forth with a huff of laughter and Sherlock’s lip curled up in a half smile. To John's surprise, however, Sherlock did cease speaking, the room falling eerily quiet the next moment. Glancing up from his seated position, John saw the look of pure, single-minded concentration on Sherlock's face and knew that he'd gone off someplace deep inside his own mind. 

 

                                                                                                                           ----- 

 

 

An hour later found the men unmoved, which simply meant that nothing had been accomplished. Sherlock paced in silent thought while John remained seated on the floor, leaning his back against the old bed with his eyes closed. He absently rubbed at his bruised knee and contemplated texting the clinic to tell them that he'd not be making it in tomorrow. He was used to these periods of time where the air in the flat became charged with potential energy. It hung in heavy clouds, hesitating at the corners of the rooms, waiting for the spring inside Sherlock to snap. It was how the flat always felt when Sherlock sank down into himself, and John knew it could be hours, if not days before he resurfaced and the energy of the flat settled back into its normal calm.

 

The subtle humming vibrations were new to the equation, however, and John spent long minutes deciding if leaning into their sensation was a good thing or a dangerous one. He liked how it licked at the edges of his mind, willing him to relax. He could feel tension leave his shoulders each time he allowed himself to submit to the feeling he now associated with magic echoing through the room, and wanted to know if that wasn't some kind of betrayal to do so.  Was the acceptance of its presence permission for it to continue? Wasn't the goal of this exercise to eradicate the magic so Sherlock's mind could be his own again? When John had shown up on the doorstep to 221B that morning, Sherlock had been in a drugged stupor that ranked among the top three binges John had ever been privy to -- it was beyond upsetting, it was infuriating. John wanted to turn on his heel and leave Sherlock in the dust to hit rock bottom alone, but then that damn dressing gown created a cocooned night sky around him and the skull reanimated itself and he couldn't deny the impossible any longer. 

 

But, what good was the magic inside Sherlock if it left him unable to function? What was the point? And what had Sherlock wanted to achieve by searching for it? He looked over at his friend, glassy-eyed and buzzing with barely contained manic energy and hoped dearly that he'd come back to himself soon. He wanted to do something productive. He wanted to go to Old Bailey. 

 

Letting his head fall, once again, back to the bed behind him he found himself wishing for a cup of tea. 

 

“Yoo hoo!”

 

Mrs. Hudson waltzed into the room not a second after John had pictured a cup of bracing, hot tea in his hands and he lifted his head, blinking in amazement. She placed the tea tray down on the floor in front of John and then tutted at the state of the bed behind him.

 

“What have you two boys been up to?”

 

John sighed, “Mrs. Hudson --”

 

“No need to explain, dear. I understand.” She patted John on the head as if he were a labrador retriever and exited the room as quickly as she’d come.

 

“How does she do that?”

 

“What? Interrupt a perfectly good thought process?”

 

It took John a second to realize that Sherlock's eyes were once again razor-sharp and staring right at him. The energy in the room had changed from potential to kinetic and John smiled despite himself; Sherlock was back. 

 

“No. I was just thinking that I could use a cup of tea, and there she was, with tea. It was like--”

 

“Magic,” Sherlock said, laying the word out thick and long with insinuation.

 

John shook his head with a laugh but shrugged his shoulders with acceptance. “Yeah, magic.”

 

He was becoming assimilated to the word. It no longer gritted against his teeth as he spoke it, and seemed more natural to say, normal even -- which disturbed the good sense out of him. Magic was not normal, and Sherlock’s headaches, strangely anthropomorphic dressing gown, lucid dreaming, and overwhelming episodes of vibration attacks were not something he was willing to let Sherlock continue living with.

 

“We need to go to Old Bailey.”

 

“Of course we do, John.”

 

“Then why are we still here?” he asked as he sipped his (delicious and perfectly prepared) tea.

 

“I’m thinking.”

 

“You've been thinking! Have you gotten anywhere?"

 

Sherlock just scowled at the floor.

 

"You said yourself earlier that you can’t remember exactly how this all happened. That you blacked out.”

 

“I know, John.”

 

“Well, thanks to your mind sending me through an electric Kool-Aid acid test of a lucid dream, we have a lead. So, let's go.” He went to stand but Sherlock halted his movement by stepping forward into his personal space, and John sank back down.  

 

“Why was Basil there?” Sherlock asked, ignoring everything John had just said. 

 

Despite this being a typical move in Sherlock's bag of tricks, it didn't stop John from ignoring him right back. He deliberately took his time arranging his legs in front of him and taking a long sip of tea before answering. “I think your subconscious supplied him to speak for you in ways that you couldn’t. I don’t think that the Basil in the dream was the same person . . . ghost, figment, whatever, that popped out of the fireplace, just the one you made up in your head.”

 

“And what makes you think it wasn’t a painfully accurate portrayal of the man?”

 

“He was a drama queen.”

 

Sherlock glared down at John with a pale, threatening gaze that didn't intimidate John in the slightest. Seeing that he was making no headway, Sherlock offered him a hand which John readily took, and hefted himself up onto his feet with an ease of movement he wasn’t expecting. John had been feeling every bit of his forty two years as of late, especially when standing from a seated position and he’d grown to hate every creak of his bones and twinge of his spine. The jolt of smooth, capable, flexibility he’d normally associated with a much younger version of himself (one that was used to jogging ten miles a day and carrying a rifle while wearing heavy body armor) intrigued him.

 

"Thank you." 

 

Sherlock nodded his welcome. 

 

John gestured to Sherlock's dressing gown. The silk had brushed his skin as Sherlock helped him up from the floor and it made John wonder. “So, are the things around you affected by the magic or were they . . . magic already? Like Basil. Was that skull already some kind of relic?" 

 

Sherlock’s eyebrows drew together, morphing his face into a scowl of disappointment and John knew what that look meant without even needing to guess - Sherlock didn’t know.

 

“Well, we can always toss Basil in the hearth again and see what happens,” John said, going for levity.

 

A rare, uncomfortable silence fell between them. There was a slight buzz in the air, like a heat ripple on a blacktop but there was no discernible temperature difference in the bedroom. John absently scratched at his neck, feeling the tell-tale tickle of feather light vibrations itching just under his skin. He knew it was the magic making its presence known, and it made John uncomfortable. He tried very hard not to visibly squirm in front of Sherlock.

 

“How’s the headache?” John asked, needing to break the silence.  

 

“Disgustingly present.”

 

“So good, then?"

 

“Yes.”

 

“I’ll buy you chips on the way to Old Bailey,” John taunted, hoping Sherlock would take the bait. If his answering grin was any indication, he’d taken it hook, line and sinker.

 

“After you, John.”

 

Sherlock made a grand gesture with his arm, stepping aside and allowing John to walk ahead of him. He hung back for a moment, letting the feeling of John being back in his life settle deep within his bones. He soaked in the long-missed sensation of such incredible, steady warmth clinging to him, so much more potent now because of the magic swirling ever present in his mind. With a steadying breath he stepped through the door and followed John, down to the front stairwell, and out into London beyond. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They're finally leaving the flat! I didn't except them to stay in that damn room all chapter. Silly boys. They subliminally want to stay near a bed, just in case, I suppose. 
> 
> I've tweaked some of the earlier chapters to allow this story to be spoiler free for the fourth season. It essentially reads like a series 2 story, but can exist in either spheres.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings apply for pining!Sherlock and banter.

John stood on the rain soaked pavement of Old Bailey and stared at the website directory for The Central Criminal Court on his small phone screen. Carl Powers’ name glowed back at him on the page of listed department employees.

 

“He works here," John stated, intrigued but not surprised. 

 

“Yes.”

 

“So, you paid him a visit last week?”

 

“Apparently.”

 

“Was it for a case?”

 

“Why else would I come to a courthouse, John?”

 

“Well, you’ve been summoned a fair number of times.”

 

“I’m not currently wanted by the government.”

 

“That’s rare for you.”

 

“Yes. It is.”

 

“So, you visited Carl.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“For a case.”

 

“Must you keep repeating the things we’ve already established or are you going to attempt to be useful and shut up?”

 

“That’s not a nice way to treat the man who just bought you chips.”

 

“They were entirely too greasy.”

 

“You still ate them, I noticed.”

 

“One does not throw out perfectly good chips, John.”

 

“You just said they were greasy.”

 

“My point exactly.”

 

John huffed out a small laugh and Sherlock hummed low in this throat, a sound of contentment. He’d missed the sound of John’s laughter, the lightness it brought to the air around them, as if the very decibels could decrease the biometric pressure in the atmosphere.

 

“Are we going in?” John asked.

 

“Perhaps.”

 

John turned his attention to the Edwardian building looming large and ominous in front of him. On the sidewalk below it, an out of place group of school-age children all in burgundy blazers ran past, shouting and laughing. John checked the time on his watch, _23:00 hours_.

 

“What are those kids doing out so late?”

 

Sherlock was two steps ahead him, already crossing the road to follow their path.

 

The sound of the children’s caterwauling carried them across the intersection of Newgate Street where Old Bailey turned into Giltspur Street just beyond. John and Sherlock were quick to follow them down the block, the air vibrating around them, until the familiar facade of the building to John’s right stopped him in his tracks.

 

There, across Giltspur Street, to the right-hand side of a telephone box and in front of an innocuous park bench, lay the rain-darkened patch of pavement where John had seen Sherlock fall to his death three painful years prior. The sight of blood splashed across Sherlock’s too-white skin, surrounding his unseeing, unearthly eyes would forever be etched in John’s mind. It was a festering wound of a memory embedded behind John’s eyelids every time he allowed his feelings to overtake him. That image would never be wiped away no matter how many times he’d now seen Sherlock standing tall, imposing and impossibly alive before him. John had been to St. Bart’s since that awful day, the hospital was a large part of his life, but not on this side of the campus, never on this street.

 

Panic rose in his throat and he bent at the hip, his hands coming to rest on his knees. His vision swam and the air buzzed around him, overwhelming his already shaken senses. He was losing control, and quickly. He hadn’t had a panic attack in years, and yet, he could feel his rational self leaving him behind, with nothing but paranoia and pain and the pounding of his own pulse in his ears.

 

Something solid and dark encircled him. Strong bands of charcoal draped fabric pulled him out of the thick fog of his internal storm, dragging him backward, turning his head away from that terrible ledge and that terrible, innocuous bench and that terrible patch of pavement.

 

Sherlock’s cold, agile fingers dug beneath the collar of John’s coat, finding the tensed muscles of his neck and kneaded the knots away with measured practice. In a moment of self-awareness John realised that he was curled into Sherlock’s body, sitting on his lap and being rocked, as if he were a nothing more than a frightened child. He hated that he fit so well against Sherlock’s chest, he despised how small he felt just inside the folds of Sherlock’s coat, and how damn comforting it all was because it was also incredibly emasculating. His brain warred with itself to push away and to huddle deeper.

 

“I hate you. I fucking hate you.” John rasped out, over and over, his voice hoarse, though he hadn’t been screaming.

 

“I know, John.”

 

“I hate you.”

 

“I know.”

 

Sherlock took the abusive, painful words because he knew they weren’t true. John hated Sherlock for what he had done, and the consequences he hadn’t been around to witness. He knew now that those memories would forever haunt the man who fit so perfectly in his lap, and in his life, but he also knew that John would always remain his friend. Sherlock held onto that powerful knowledge as John attempted to put himself back together in his arms. His hand lingered on the back of John’s neck, rubbing soothing circles into his damp skin. It was a selfish liberty he hoped John wouldn’t blame him for later.

 

The children had long skittered away into the night, the sounds of their voices had cut off abruptly further along Smithfield. As Sherlock sat with John he stared down the street, visualizing the map of London before him and wondering what trick of sound allowed for such a phenomenon to occur.  

 

“We should go find Carl’s office.” John’s voice was low and muffled, his face pressing into the collar of Sherlock’s coat.

 

 _Distraction_ , Sherlock thought. John was trying to distract his thoughts by focusing his attentions elsewhere. It didn’t seem to be working as the man remained huddled against him, but Sherlock silently commended him for trying.

 

Despite John’s suggestion, Sherlock wanted to find where those children had disappeared to -- there was something important about their presence in such an incongruent location. There was a children’s nursery nearby but the group they’d seen were school-age, and had been dressed in uniform. Vibrations had swirled in wisps of wind behind them, a sign that magic was present nearby, and there was a sense of the ethereal about them; they were not meant to be here at this time in this place. Was Sherlock seeing something happening elsewhere? Was this a message? If so, was it Carl’s doing?

 

The bells of the nearby St. Bartholomew Church rang out into the night, twelve low-pitched gongs of time - _midnight_. It made Sherlock’s attention turn from that of John and Carl and the children, to the nursery rhyme he’d had playing on loop in his mind ever since this whole mess started a week prior.

 

“ _When will you pay me, say the bells of Old Bailey,_

_When I grow rich, say the bells of Shoreditch,_

_When will that be? Say the bells of Stepney,_

_I do not know, says the great bell of Bow . . . “_ Sherlock recited, his face a mask of deep thought.  

 

“We have to go to Cheapside,” Sherlock said.

 

John shook his head, forcing his words to come to him. “Cheapside?” His voice only betrayed him slightly.

 

“St. Mary-le-Bow,” was all Sherlock said before he looked down at John, his eyes earnest and hopeful. “Care to go for a walk?”

 

“Away from here?”

 

Sherlock nodded.

 

“Oh god, yes.”

 

John eagerly clambered to his feet and Sherlock sighed at the loss. John looked at him with a confused tilt to his head before shaking himself and standing straight, shoulders back.  He was a soldier again, his emotions held in check, even if they were only barely concealed beneath the surface.

 

Sherlock had an urge to ask him if he was fit to walk, but he didn’t want to insult John with such a question, if John didn’t want to continue, he would have told him. John waved down a cab as Sherlock quickly looked up the cross streets of St. Mary-le-Bow church before climbing into the back seat. It seemed as though John wasn't in the mood for walking after all. Much to Sherlock’s surprise, John slumped almost immediately against him on the back seat as the cab pulled away from the curb and Sherlock restrained himself from commenting. He squeezed his eyes shut, forced his breath into a normal rhythm and looked back down at his phone, hoping for distraction. There was a feather-light vibration humming at the base of Sherlock’s neck and he hoped it was just John’s breath huffing out against his skin and not the tell-tale sign of a most inconvenient attack brewing.

 

The two of them made a bloody awful pair, Sherlock thought. What with John’s long-suppressed emotional turmoil and Sherlock’s magically induced highs ebbing and flowing like the tide inside his head. He considered rerouting the cab back to Baker Street, but they were only a few blocks away from the church, perhaps he could make it before the worst of the vibrations hit him?

 

“You’re shaking,” John’s low voice cut the silence in the cab. His hand coming to rest on Sherlock’s forearm.

 

“I am?” Of course he was. _Shit._

 

“Sherlock. What’s wrong?”

 

Sherlock closed his eyes, willing his mind to obey his commands as its only master, and not the magic that had overtaken the proceedings so rudely and without consent.

 

“I’ll be okay,” he breathed out, though his voice shook.

 

John, now realising that his medical expertise would be of use, snapped out of his slump in a flash. Help was needed, which meant that there was no time for him to lay about in a state of pained-memory and self-reflection. He sat up like a bolt of lightning, his eyes alight with concern as he took in the state of his friend before him.

 

“Sherlock, look at me.”

 

Sherlock begrudgingly opened his eyes to stare back at John, and saw his face pale.

 

“What is it?” he asked as a headache started to bloom painful and heavy at his temples. 

 

“Your face, Sherlock.”

 

"What about it?”

 

John ignored the question and rounded on the cabbie up front. “Change of plans. 221B Baker Street. Now!”

 

Sherlock didn’t have time to protest. He barely had time to register the change in John’s voice from a captain’s command to a full-on shout as he ordered the cabbie to alter their course. All he had time for was to glance at his friend, take in his worried gaze, and fall, headfirst into darkness, hoping that John would be there to catch him.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a shortie for those lovely few who have been reading and commenting. I appreciate you all so much. This isn't beta'd, forgive me.

“Mrs. Hudson!” John bellowed as he dragged Sherlock through the front door of 221B.

 

Mrs. Hudson came skittering out of her downstairs sitting room with a darkened shock of worry shadowing her face. She was wearing an apron and there was flour smeared along her cheek and dusted in her hair.

 

“Oh dear, John, what on earth?”

 

“Help me,” John said as he bent his knees to sling Sherlock’s gangly body over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and took to the stairs.

 

“How?” Mrs. Hudson asked, following gingerly behind them. She stretched out her arms as if their presence at John’s back would help him carry the startlingly heavy detective.

 

John paused at the landing to catch his breath, turning his face to the side to just barely catch a glance of Mrs. Hudson in his perferary. “You need to tell me what this is.”

 

Wringing her hands, Mrs. Hudson took one step back down the stair, “What do you mean, dear?”

 

“This!” John shouted as he rounded the landing and heading towards the door of his old flat. He didn’t need to gesture at the catatonic state of Sherlock slung over his shoulder, it was painfully obvious what he meant.

 

Once in the sitting room, John deposited Sherlock onto the sofa with a grunt. He checked his pulse, lifted one eyelid to see if his pupil was dilated (it was), then turned towards the kitchen to turn on the electric kettle, and pointed a commanding finger at Mrs. Hudson on the way.

 

“You. Sit.”

 

Frowning, Mrs. Hudson did as she was told, perching herself on the edge of John’s chair. “You’re being rather rude right now, just so you know.”

 

John shook his head and sighed. “Sorry.”

 

“That’s alright. I know you’re just worried about Sherlock.” She continued to wring her hands as she spoke, her nerves betraying her calm tone of voice.

 

“I need to know what’s happening, Mrs. Hudson. I’m sick of being in the dark.”

Turning ‘round in the chair Mrs. Hudson starred at the sad picture of John in the kitchen: head hung low with his hair falling forward out of its normal tamed state, arms braced on the counter, and his knuckles white with tension. There were certain rules about magic, she knew, rules that shouldn’t be broken, but seeing her boys in pain was something she didn’t want to endure.     Before she could even offer him some phrase of comfort, John spoke.

 

“You didn’t flinch when you saw us in the bedroom. You didn’t comment when the stairwell was turned into a bloody planetarium. You know what’s going on, and you can help me help him.”

 

It was a finite statement, leaving no room for discussion. He wasn’t asking anymore, and he wasn’t commanding, but Mrs. Hudson knew that she was going to help John Watson because his determination willed it so. Sherlock had fallen down a rather long and confounding rabbit hole with his careless experimenting, and Mrs. Hudson was not ready to be anyone’s guide in the matter, but she could see that the situation was far and away beyond her now, and the consequences should probably be good and well damned.

 

The kettle boiled and John snatched it off its base and poured out three mismatched cups of tea. He brought two into the sitting room handing one to Mrs. Hudson and placing the other on the coffee table in front of Sherlock’s long legs before heading back to the kitchen to pick up his own cup. Leaning back against the counter he held the cup close to his face, letting the steam wash over him and warm his chilled nose.

 

The realisation hit him a moment too late and he cursed at his out-of-practice instincts. The flat had been colder than normal since they’d walked in, he just hadn’t bothered to notice. Sherlock would have, John thought and he cursed again.

 

“Shit.”

 

“Language, dear.”

 

The air around him dropped another two degrees as the hautey voice of Basil floated through the kitchen door from the landing. “Yes, dear, language.”

 

John had been around his fair share of cadavers, bones, and exhumed skeletons in his time, but Basil was most assuredly becoming his least favorite out of the bunch. He didn’t bother responding to him. Instead, he turned his attention towards Mrs. Hudson, who didn’t seem at all put out by the fact that a ghost of a man in very odd clothing had just invaded her property without even bothering to knock first. To John’s shock, she actually heaved a put-upon sigh, stood from the chair and walked towards him with a waggling finger.

 

“Basil, get back on that mantel this instant.”

 

Basil pouted at her. “Now, now Mrs. Hudson, please don’t make me go sit in the corner when there’s actually something fun going on.”

 

“You’re frightening poor John.”

 

“No, he isn’t,” John scoffed.

 

“There, see. He isn’t frightened. Now can I stay and play?”

 

“What are you, seven?” John asked, crossing his arms. Basil ignored him.

 

“I’m here to enquire after our friend,” Basil said as he waltzed past them both into the sitting room. “Ah, yes. Little Sherlock, all curled up on the settee.” Basil sat next to Sherlock’s limp form with a twirl of tartan and took off his hat, his hair flying out in a halo of red around his eerily pale face. He leaned in to inspect him, much like John had done minutes before, and to John’s horror actually sniffed the hollow of his throat.

 

“What are you doing?”

 

“Scenting him.”

 

“Pardon? Are you part dog?”

 

Basil threw John a withering glance. “No, you idiot, there’s a certain scent associated with magic, if you haven’t picked up on that yet, which clearly you haven’t, and Sherlock here reeks of it.”

 

Perturbed, John marched forward and leaned over Sherlock, sniffing gingerly at the hollow of his throat like Basil had done. He didn’t smell anything out of the ordinary, just the familiarity of Sherlock and perhaps a lingering edge of tobacco.

 

Ice cold fingers dug into the skin of John’s nape, pushing his face further into Sherlock’s neck with a force he wouldn’t have associated with such a dainty figment.

 

“Breathe deep, John. It’s there. You only have to accept it.”

 

John did not like being told what to do, and fought back hard against Basil’s hand, which only made him falter and brace his arms on either side of Sherlock to prevent himself from falling into his lap entirely.

 

“Alright! Just . . . let go of me,”

 

Basil released John and watched him with keen eyes as the doctor took in the smell of Sherlock’s throat one more time.

 

“It helps if you lick the skin.”

 

John’s head flew up, and he glared at Basil. “Seriously, if you’re having me on--”

 

Basil raised his hands in surrender. “I’m not. I swear. I’m just helping you _deduce_.”

 

“I’m not licking his skin.”

 

Basil shrugged. “Fine by me.” He jumped up off the sofa and went to throw an arm over Mrs. Hudson back in the doorway of the kitchen. “You’re tea is getting cold.”

 

“Oh? I . . .” She trailed off, looking worriedly at John.

 

Looking between the two of them, Basil had come to the end of his patience with these silly mortals.

 

Sighing, he said, "Alright fine. It’s time to tell you both a story.”


	9. Chapter 9

Sherlock’s mind came back to him abruptly and with a force he did not appreciate. The headache that came racing along with his consciousness was also very much an unwelcome development. 

 

He could hear voices he recognized and knew from the smells around him that he was in his flat on Baker Street. Reluctant to open his eyes, he listened, hoping to glean information that he may not be privy to if it were known that he had woken. Keeping his breathing steady to mimic the pattern of deep slumber, he heard John respond to what Basil had just finished saying. 

 

“So we have Sherlock to thank for your presence, then?” 

 

“You have the magic to thank.” 

 

“Right. And he made the magic happen.” 

 

“Is that what the young folk are calling it these days?” 

 

John sighed and Basil sulked at him, “oh, you’re no fun.”

 

“I don’t find this very funny.” 

 

“Oh please. Lighten up.”

 

John pushed ahead, clearly wanting to move on from Basil’s derailment. “Sherlock started all this with an experiment that you said had something to do with microbial remains in ash.”

 

“Yes.” 

 

“And then accidentally created a spell.”

 

“Again, yes.”

 

“Great. That’s just great.” John’s voice was thick with sarcasm. 

 

“Do you understand now?” Basil’s was thicker. 

 

“Understand? You mean do I understand that my friend opened up a world of magic that operates parallel to our own but goes undetected by normal people, such as myself?” 

 

“Yes.” 

 

Sherlock heard the slight scrape of his leather chair legs push back as John stood. “No, I don’t bloody understand!” he snapped. “This is not information one simply swallows whole. Sixteen  hours ago, everything was fine. Normal. Boring, even!” 

 

“Well, dear, you two are always complaining about being bored,” Mrs. Hudson interjected. 

 

John rounded on her. “And why were you baking at whatever-time-in-the-morning this is?” 

 

Mrs. Hudson simply waved a hand at him as if that were a ludacris question. John checked his watch, confirming that it wasn’t a ludacris question. Landladies of Mrs. Hudson’s age most assuredly did not keep graveyard hours for their baking needs. John filed that bit of confusion away for later contemplation. 

 

Rubbing his hands over his face, he said, “God help me, but I almost wish this were a drug binge.” 

 

“Oi! Bite your tongue,” Mrs. Hudson scolded. 

 

“At least I’d know what to do!” John shot back. “I’d search the flat. Get him to the hospital. Order tests. There’d be a structure, a reason for each step.” 

 

Sherlock could now hear John pacing the carpet and squinted one eye open to sneak a look at him. He was clearly distraught. His hair was all awry from his agitated gesticulations. Strands stubbornly dropped into his eyes and he pushed them back absently as he paced. He had long since taken off his motor jacket and jumper, revealing a checkered shirt with carefully rolled sleeves, and at some point, had kicked off his shoes. The toe of his left sock displayed a tear which John had no doubt sewn back together himself, ever the pragmatic, practical man. Deja vu swept over Sherlock as he noted how perfectly at home John looked, even in his haggard state, and he squeezed his eye shut once more blocking out the harsh reality. This wasn’t John’s home anymore and as soon as he figured out how to help Sherlock he’d leave again. Sherlock hated that fact. 

 

It was time for him to wake up. 

 

“John.” 

 

John’s head snapped to find Sherlock awake and sitting up on the couch. He stalked towards him, hands fisted at his sides. 

 

“How are you feeling?”

 

“Thirsty.” 

 

John pointed to the long ignored cup of tea in front of him. “Drink.” 

 

Sherlock scowled. “It’s cold.” 

 

“Drink.” 

 

Sherlock rolled his eyes, but picked up the tea cup and drained it in one gulp. 

 

“You certainly are bossy, aren’t you?” Basil snipped.

 

“The sooner we figure this out, the sooner he goes back on that bloody mantel,” John told Sherlock, ignoring Basil. 

 

“What did he tell you?” Sherlocked asked. 

 

“That I’m nothing but a pathetic, boring,  _ normal _ person and that you somehow aren’t.” 

 

“That’s true. Except the part about you being pathetic and boring.” 

 

The corner of John’s mouth quirked at the roundabout compliment. “He also said that the magic chose you. That doesn’t seem to make it compatible with your system, however, since it’s been…” he struggled for the right word, “ _ attacking _ you every four hours.” 

 

Sherlock tipped his head. “Four?” 

 

“Yes, four. The hallway. The bedroom. The courthouse. Four hours apart.” 

 

“Bravo, John. I hadn’t realised.” 

 

John blinked at him. “Well, that’s terrifying.” 

 

“It is, isn’t it?” 

 

“I just said as much.” 

 

“I do seem to be... not at my best.” 

 

“Obvious.” 

 

“That’s normally my line.” 

 

“Well, you’re not your  _ normal _ self right now, are you?” 

 

“Maybe if you could make me more tea? Hot, this time would be preferable.” 

 

“You could say please, you know?” 

 

“Yes. But I also know that you’ll do what I say regardless so why waste the breath?”

 

“Christ, you’re impossible.” 

 

“I know,” Sherlock beamed at him, “and you’re still here.”  

 

A sound of disgust echoed from across the room. “Good lord. Could you two be more obvious?” Basil muttered, snapping John and Sherlock’s attention away from each other. 

 

Mrs. Hudson sighed the sigh of a woman who had long since become accustomed to such displays and shook her head as she stood from John’s chair. “I’ll go make you a cuppa, Sherlock.“

 

“Ah, thank you, Mrs. Hudson.” 

 

She tutted and waved her hands about as she left through the kitchen door. No doubt heading downstairs to retrieve her favorite loose-leaf oolong that Sherlock never had on hand upstairs since he never bothered to do the shopping. 

 

With Mrs. Hudson gone and the firelight dwindling, the air in the sitting room became thick and charged with what John now knew to be the heady presence of magic. John noticed that Basil’s form shimmered, a disconcerting image to witness.  

 

“Better add more fuel to that fire, John. Otherwise, I won’t be around to bother you. What a pity that would be.” 

 

John quirked an eyebrow at him. “There was no fire in the hearth when you first appeared.”

 

“Well spotted. In that case, it was Mrs. Hudson’s fire that allowed me to pass through. Haven’t either of you noticed, yet? The fire helps me to come and go as I please. This house represents a ‘thin’ place.” 

 

Upon seeing the look of confusion on John’s face and utter fascination on Sherlock’s, Basil continued.  “You would know this if you had bothered to study Irish history, but of course you bloody Brits don’t give two tits about Ireland do you? In Irish folklore, a thin place acts as a divider between the tangible world you currently inhabit and the otherworld from which I hail. Sherlock you chose this house for a reason all those years ago, and it wasn’t because Mrs. Hudson just so happened to be the landlady who owed you a favor and you had just so happened to like her as a member of the human race you normally detest. She’s more than just human, you must realise this now. She’s your keeper.” 

 

Sherlock stood, enrapt in this new information. 

 

Basil saw how eager he looked and decided to end his storytelling for the evening. It might have been John’s rudeness that urged Basil away, or maybe he just felt like being a stubborn git, but the two men in front of him would just have to speculate on that after he had gone and left them hanging on their theoretical hooks. 

 

“Well, I feel as if I’ve done my haunting duties justice for one evening. I’m off then. Ta!” 

 

Before Sherlock or John could even reach an arm out in protest, Basil had tipped his hat and dematerialized in a shimmering vibration of smoke and dust, leaving both men behind in the cold quite literally since Basil had extinguished the fire with his departure. 

 

John turned towards Sherlock, mouth slack. “Should I...?” 

 

“Yes! Build up the damn fire again.” 

 

John leveled Sherlock with a look, but nevertheless stalked forward and started to assemble kindling in the hearth. Behind him, Sherlock paced. 

 

“Powers. St. Mary-la-Bow. Those children - they were a sign. Dammit. The variables are everywhere and yet none of them are lining up.” He waved his arms around him, trying to catalog everything into neat order. 

 

“You’re the constant in this equation, Sherlock. You started all this.” 

 

“Well, I didn’t mean to, now did I?”

 

“Didn’t you?” John turned round, his hand balanced on one knee, ready to push of the floor at a moment’s notice. Sherlock stared at him barely able to conceal the sting of John’s words. 

 

“You think I did this on purpose?”

 

John looked back at the beginning embers of the fire, breaking their connection. “I don’t know. It would certainly be convenient.” 

 

“John--” 

 

“You’re worse than a damn child. You constantly need attention. You get bored. You self-medicate, to put it lightly, and you drive me up the bloody wall with your demands.” John sprung up from the floor, and in two paces was face to face with Sherlock. “You don’t think that on some unconscious level you cooked up this insanity to bring me back here?” 

 

John’s chest heaved with his increasing heart rate as he spoke and Sherlock couldn’t help but stare. He hadn’t intended on all this happening. It certainly hadn’t been planned, but Sherlock knew part of what John had said to be true. The more eccentric, more dangerous the case, the more likely John would follow, and Sherlock needed John to follow. 

 

Sherlock needed John. Period. It was beginning to dawn on him what a complicated web he had spun for the two of them to untangle. Sherlock didn’t know which thread to pull first, they all seemed precarious and laced with painful and aggravating uncertainty. 

 

A knock sounded behind them. “Yoo hoo!” 

 

Hanging his head, Sherlock sighed, “as always Mrs. Hudson, your timing is impeccable.” 


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A surprise new chapter! This came pouring out of me this morning, and I thought why not send it out into the cyber-sphere? Enjoy.

Mrs. Hudson hung in the doorway, taking in the scene before her. 

 

“You two having a bit of a domestic just now, or . . .?” She let the insinuation linger, not that she needed to, Sherlock had taken two steps back from John in painful recognition of what had been brewing in the air before her rude interruption. 

 

“No,” John punched out, his breath ragid. “No, Mrs. Hudson, we’re fine.” 

 

“Huh, sure you are, dear. I made enough for two, now come on, both of you sit and sip.” 

 

The men did as they were told. Sherlock kept his eyes averted from John as he sat in his chair and crossed his legs. John, however, maneuvered himself into his old armchair by memory while Mrs. Hudson handed him a cup of tea, all the while never looking away from Sherlock’s face. He was reading him, using Sherlock’s own methods against him, as it were. There was a tell-tale red hue along the sharp edges of his cheekbones and his insistence on not meeting John’s gaze was proof enough that he was embarrassed. Embarrassed of what, exactly, was the question? 

 

“I’ll be downstairs . . .  if you need me.” 

 

She left without either of them acknowledging her, and didn’t seem to mind in the slightest. The way she hastily removed herself from the room told John enough about how the air must feel around them. He could see hairline waves of tangible magic rippling off of Sherlock. They cascaded down his shoulders and over the tips of his toes before rolling across the carpet and crashing into John’s legs. He felt each wave hit him and knew with each push of energy that Sherlock was seething with uncertainty, and the emotion was distracting him. The fear of not knowing had become Sherlock’s second greatest enemy. 

 

John sipped his tea, swallowing without tasting. It was more the mechanics of the action that soothed him than the warmth the tea provided. He was glad to have something to hold onto and do, however small. It kept him from overturning the armchair and storming out of the flat, or worse, overturning the armchair and advancing on Sherlock. He wasn’t sure how that outcome would resolve itself if he let his composure slip, so instead, he sipped his too-hot tea and sat like a stone in his chair, waiting for the princess of a man across from him to do something. 

 

Sherlock stared at the fire for minutes on end, attempting to lose himself to this thoughts but the clarity of the meditation never came. Resigned to the fact that he may have to deal with the consequences of his actions for once, he sighed and looked to the tea in his lap. He took a sip and his senses went off like sirens. 

 

Returning to himself his eyes widened as he looked over to John finished his cup. “NO!”

 

John, startled, lowered the cup to its saucer before he dared drop it. “Jesus, Sherlock. What?”

 

“The tea!”

 

“What about the - -” John realised a moment too late that his words were slurring. His eyebrows knit together in confusion and he stared down at the empty cup. The leaves lingering in the bottom swirled into different patterns and shapes and John found himself leaning forward, wanting to make sense of them. 

 

His nose met with porcelain and he could barely hear Sherlock shouting his name as a sickening feeling overtook him and he was catapulted into a world of swirling watercolor. Coming to a moment later he blinked and found himself sitting in his chair on Baker Street, a cup of tea still in his hands. 

 

“What the-?” 

 

He scratched at the back of his head and took in the room around him. It was more dishelved than it had been a moment ago, and  _ wait a minute _ . . . the light was streaming in through the curtains. It had been full dark not a minute earlier. The sun was at its zenith in the sky, allowing warm afternoon light to cascade across the many layers of paperwork and books and miscellaneous paraphernalia that Sherlock had collected over the years. 

 

“How on earth-?” 

 

John got up from his chair and checked behind the curtains, but no lightsource other than the actual sun beaming down from on high revealed itself to him. He turned and picked up a stray newspaper on the desk and read the date along the top column. Astonished at the confounding date displayed there, John dropped the paper and hurried down the hall to Sherlock’s bedroom. The door was closed and John barged in without so much as a knock. 

 

Sherlock was nowhere in the room. What was in the room was an impressive display of books littering every available surface, all of them open to different pages about magic and energy barriers and yes, even thin places like Basil had described. Sherlock must have deleted that bit, John thought, considering he had been so enrapt at the time of Basil’s tale. 

 

There were also jars of what upon closer inspection turned out to be ash. 

 

“Christ, you and your bloody obsessions,” John mumbled as he counted no less than twelve jars of ash scattered about, and then a myriad of other opaque containers, their contents remaining a mystery. 

 

Something occurred to him as he surveyed the room, “This must be . . .” 

 

He ran back out a moment later, heading back towards the sitting room. There on the mantel was the skull, and a crazy idea that John hoped he wouldn’t regret came to him. 

 

Five minutes later, a roaring fire burned happily away in the hearth and John found himself staring daggers at the skull, willing the damn thing to come to life. 

 

“Come on, you prick.” 

 

“That really isn’t a nice way to encourage my appearance, Dr. Watson.” 

 

John had never before been so grateful to hear that blasted, high-society voice. He turned and almost smiled at the bastard. “Basil.” 

 

“Yes, I seem to have been summoned.”

 

“How are you there, but you’re skull is still here?” John asked, pointing to and from. 

 

Sighing Basil replied, “you know nothing, John, really.” 

 

“Enlighten me?”

 

“You first. What have you learned so far?” 

 

John leveled him with a look but was too keyed up with adrenaline to put much heat behind it. He felt as if he were on the precipice of something profound and didn’t want to derail now. 

 

“I’ve gone back in time.” 

 

“Very astute, Doctor.” 

 

“This is the day Sherlock started all this.” 

 

Basil nodded. 

 

“I need to find him then! I need to stop it all from happening.” 

 

Basil held up a bony hand. In fact, his fingers were more slender than Sherlock’s, John noted. 

 

“Hold it right there, Doctor, for there’s a hole in your hypothesis.” 

 

“What do you mean?” 

 

“Yes, you’re seeing the day Sherlock turned his world, and yours for that matter, upside down, but no, you can not stop it from happening.” 

 

“Why not?” 

 

“Because, dear Doctor, it already has.” 

 

John opened his mouth to reply but the retort died on his lips. So instead, Basil continued. “You’re seeing a memory, John. You’re passing through a layer of time, not actually experiencing it over again. That’s why my skull still rests on that mantel. That’s also why you won’t be able to help Sherlock, who is currently convulsing and in danger of exfisitaging on his own vomit in the kitchen.” 

 

John’s ears immediately heard the sounds of choked breathing and ran past Basil into the kitchen, where on the far side of the worktop, obscured by chairs and fallen debris, lay Sherlock. His head was thrown back on the dark wood, his eyes open but completely white. 

 

“Sherlock!” 

 

John fell to his knees, glass cut into his skin, but he didn’t give a damn. He attempted to pick up Sherlock, gather him to his chest, get him breathing, but the man continually slipped through his fingers. He could barely grasp him, his body wavering in the light every time he tried. 

 

“But I . . . “ he turned and shouted at Basil. “I opened the bedroom door. I pulled back the curtain. Why can’t I touch him?” 

 

“That’s not his corporeal body, John. You can’t affect anything in this memory because it’s only that. You can only witness.” 

 

“But the bloody curtains--” 

 

“This house is a thin place. It remains solid no matter what time frame or variation. It is a constant, and a very important one. You should do well to remember that, John Watson.” 

 

John was sick of being told what he could and couldn’t do and decided to do something about it. He turned in a whirl and wrapped a strong hand around Basil’s throat. 

 

“You can not kill me, John. I’m already dead.” 

 

“It’ll help me feel better, at least.” 

 

“Will it?” 

 

Despite John’s grip, Basil’s voice remained strong and defiant, illuminating his claim that his hold had no power. The fact deflated John and he dropped his arm, apologizing as he slumped in a heap next to his friend. 

 

“I need to help him.” His voice cracked but he didn’t care. 

 

“You are just by being here. Hasn’t it occurred to you yet that you were sent to this place for a reason?” 

 

John’s watery eyes met Basil’s in confusion. “What do you mean?” 

 

“Think, John! You drank that tea and suddenly you’re here. Why?”

 

John’s eyes widened. “Mrs. Hudson.” 

 

“Yes.” 

 

“She . . . drugged my tea.” 

 

“More or less, yes.” 

 

“But why?” 

 

“Exactly, John. Why?” 

 

John reluctantly got up off the floor of the kitchen where Sherlock lay struggling. It physically pained him to move away from him, but he pushed on, wondering why the glass from the broken pipettes had to be real, as he considered the blood on his jeans. 

 

Walking back out to the sitting room he took in his surroundings once more, cataloging the data as Sherlock would have done. 

 

“This was meant to tell me something. I’m meant to learn something from this,” he said mostly to himself but Basil responded anyway. 

 

“You knew enough to call me to help. Which I commend you for, by the way. Now you just need to realise what clue has been left for you in this picture.” 

 

“If you’re here to help, then why don’t you . . . you know, help.”

 

Basil merely raised one thin eyebrow. 

 

“Right, okay.” John moved around the flat, trying to observe everything and seeing nothing in return. He couldn’t make sense of it, what was he meant to see, or witness that was so different? 

 

At the thought of witnessing something, he turned. “Wait,” he said, and ran back to the kitchen to where Sherlock lay. 

 

He took in the scene from a clinical point of view, trying his best to separate himself from his emotions at seeing Sherlock in such a precariously dangerous state. He knew for a fact that Sherlock was living and breathing back in the present, that he had made it through this ordeal. That fact alone allowed John to be as cold and calculating as possible while surveying the madness before him. 

 

There was a book lying half obscured by Sherlock’s body on the floor that he hadn’t noticed earlier. Unlike Sherlock’s body, John was able to move it, since it belonged to the flat and therefore wasn’t altered by the magic that had allowed John to travel to the past. 

 

John figured that he wouldn’t be able to take the book back with him to the present, but he did have his phone in his pocket. He quickly snapped pictures of the page the book had been open to, the outside cover, the back, the binding, and the inside flap where an inscription read. 

 

_ To my beloved son, Carl. _

 

This book had no doubt belonged to the Powers family. 

 

That thought made him pause. Sherlock had forgotten all about Carl Powers until he was reminded of him. He’d forgotten about thin places too, despite John having seen a book in his bedroom about the very subject. Was there some kind of memory spell that coincided with Sherlock’s conjuring experiments? It was the only thing that made sense since Sherlock never forgot anything he deemed important, and a book that belonged to the Powers family would most definitely be important to Sherlock. 

 

Standing once more, John took in his surroundings, hoping to not leave anything unturned. Behind him he caught the site of Basil, arms folded with a satisfied grin tugging at the corner of his artistoractic mouth. 

 

“You’ve done well, Doctor.” 

 

“Have I?” 

 

“Sherlock would be proud.” 

 

“Yes, fine. Alright then. Now I just have to get back to him.” 

 

“Eager little bunny, are we?”

 

John pinched the bridge of his nose. “Must you lace everything with innuendo?” 

 

“I don’t get much entertainment these days. Haunting you two is the most fun I’ve had in centuries, so can you really blame me?”

 

“Yes. Actually, I can.” 

 

“Pity.” 

 

John walked back towards the armchair and picked up his stray teacup. Feeling like a right fool but not knowing what else to do, he assumed his position from earlier and stared down at the dregs of tea in the cup, allowing his mind to focus on the leaves, and hoping desperately that this plan would work. To his shock, they started to swirl and he found himself being drawn in once more. Behind him he heard an appreciative whistle and Basil’s fading voice saying, “my my, how clever you are Dr. Watson.” 

 

A moment later, John was back, eyes blinking, adjusting to the darker room of the flat. 

 

Sherlock was in front of him, his hands gripping the tops of his arms, and his face alight with worry. “John!” 

 

“Yes, I’m here.” 

 

Sherlock’s eyes were wide with manic intensity, and John leaned back, disturbed by the gleam in them. “I’m here, Sherlock. I’m fine.” 

 

“Mrs. Hudson --” 

 

“Spiked my tea. Yes, I picked up on that.” 

 

Sherlock sat back on his heels. “You knew?” 

 

“Not as I was drinking it, no. But afterwards, yeah.” 

 

“What happened? Tell me everything.” 

 

Sherlock did not loosen his grip on John, only lowered his hands from his shoulders to his forearms. It seemed as if Sherlock wanted to forcibly ground John in the present, not willing to let him slip back into the past. 

 

John noted the worry and the hardened, stressed set of Sherlock’s features and something inside him warmed at that. It was backward and odd of him to feel endeared by Sherlock’s panic, but he had been panicking over him, and for some reason, that was comforting. He shook himself, and refocused. Sherlock was hovering expectantly in front of him, his warm, steady breath washing over John’s skin. It smelled of bergamot and honey, and John leaned closer, forgetting himself. 

 

His phone buzzed in his hands, and he looked down. Mrs. Hudson name was displayed on the small screen, but the innuendo of the text message spoke out in loud clarity as Basil’s doing. Whatever strange feeling he’d been experiencing a moment before had gone, and John curled his fingers around his phone, figuring it was a good a place to start as any. He lifted it up and punched in the password code to bring the photo screen back to life. 

 

“Well, I found a book . . . “ 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .  
> .  
> .  
> .  
> .
> 
> I'm taking from a mixture of mythologies when it comes to the 'magic' in this story. I hope that's okay with everyone. Mrs. Hudson seems to have more and more to her each chapter, which I enjoy developing. I also suggest that if you guys are keen, do look up thin places in Irish folklore. They're fascinating. 
> 
> When I started this story, I wasn't planning on a romance between our boys, just a reconciliation and an admittance that they are in fact deeply in love with each other and should really stop being so emotionally constipated about it. The more I write, the more it seems that there might be some thing akin to romance around every corner. John certainly let his sentiments get the better of him in this chapter, didn't he? 
> 
> We'll see what happens. Time to bring back all the confusion of the church bells and Carl Powers into the fray next chapter!


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took forever, and I apologize, but it was also a beast of a chapter that I've separated into two, so there is another chapter close behind this one ready to go.

Sherlock glared at the phone in John’s hand, wanting to burn its existence out of the world. How dare that damned skull interrupt another one of the strangely charged moments between him and John that would cause his nerve endings to spasm in response. Sherlock was beginning to enjoy that odd, non-narcotic-induced sensation and and did not appreciate when a new fancy of his was snatched away from him as if he were a child.

 

He tucked his chin and pouted as John lifted the phone, pulling up something of interest (at least to John) on the small, glowing display. A smirk appeared at the corner of John’s mouth. It was not a happy smirk, nor a humorous one, it was anger. John smiled when he was angry, his lips pulling back into a sneer Sherlock didn’t think he was ever conscious of, and right then, John had the tell-tale signs of anger tugging at the edges of his weathered features. Sherlock found himself peering over the edge of the phone, wanting to see what had caused such a reaction.

 

“Well, I found a book . . . “

 

John was speaking, but Sherlock could only stare at the screen in his hands. There was the text from Basil but he didn’t get a chance to read it before John poked at the photos app and swiped through one or two before finding his target.

 

“Here,” he said, showing Sherlock a photo of the book, “you had this with you when you’d passed out from the magic for the first time. It belonged to Carl Powers.”

 

Sherlock could not remember the book’s contents but the cover imagery struck him, he had seen it, and had seen it recently.

 

“It has to be here in the flat,” John said.

 

Sherlock nodded. “Yes. It’s in your room.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“I stashed several boxes full of books and sheet music in your room upstairs. Didn’t you see them earlier?”

 

John didn’t respond, instead he turned on his heel and headed for the staircase to his old bedroom. Sherlock was fast behind him, dogging his steps on the stairs, almost making him trip.

 

“Faster, John.”

 

“Your legs are longer than mine.”

 

“So it would be prudent of me to go first.”

 

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” John stepped aside and let the madman fly past him in a swirl of blue silk.

 

The feelings Sherlock had been experiencing earlier in the living room with John had momentarily been forgotten with the excitement of having a new clue to exhume. He bounded into the bedroom and threw open the old built-in doors in the back corner.

 

John entered the room a moment later, noting Sherlock’s blue covered backside practically bouncing to and fro as he dug through the contents of the wardrobe.

 

“You never put anything away. How is it that you managed to stash the one thing we’d need up here?”

 

Sherlock’s frizzled head of curls popped up out of the box he’d been searching through with comedic timing, his head tilting to the side as he thought out an answer. “I’ve no idea. Can’t remember.”

 

John nodded, despite Sherlock not being able to see. John figured Sherlock wouldn’t be able to remember anything regarding his bringing magic into their lives until it was staring him right in the face. His memory had most definitely been altered.  

 

With a triumphant shout, Sherlock extracted the book from the bottom of the box he’d been attacking. He straightened to his full height, strode forward two paces and sat on the bed with a flourish, patting the mattress next to him in invitation. John sat down beside him without hesitation. The excitement in the air was palpable as he showed Sherlock the correct page to turn to, thanks to the pictures on his phone, and they both fell still as they read the illuminated pages.

 

Sherlock finished reading first, his posture becoming rigid next to John’s as he hurried to catch up to the end.

 

“It’s a children’s story,” John said, slightly confused.

 

“No, it’s a spell disguised as a children’s story.”

 

“Those kids in the burgundy blazers, they’re here in the book.”

 

“Yes. ‘ _A dozen children, all covered in red_.’”

 

“It’s rather dark for a bedtime story,” John noted, going back to reread from the beginning.

 

“Grimm’s fairy tales are just as dark.”

 

“Yes, but they don’t have the ability to unleash the kraken of magical consequences when retold, do they?”

 

Sherlock smirked at John and then snapped the book shut, much to John’s dismay.

 

“Hey!”

 

“We need to go, John.”

 

“Shouldn’t we read more of this book? Sherlock!”

 

But Sherlock was already heading down the stairs and slamming the door to his bedroom shut within ten seconds time. He reappeared not two minutes later fully dressed and was pulling on his dark coat as John finally descended the stairs.

 

He had a pensive look on his face that Sherlock didn’t fail to point out. “Don’t think too hard, John. Your face will freeze like that.”

 

John scoffed at him. “You’re forgetting something.”

 

Sherlock actually frowned. “What?”

 

“Why this story, Sherlock? Why this book? How did you know what page to turn to and what story to read and what about the ash?”

 

Sherlock stared at him unblinking as if he were an owl.

 

“Basil! He said this had something to do with the ash you so obsessively collect samples of.”

 

“John, really. You believed the _skull_?”

 

“Well, you weren’t really available to question, were you? You keep having fits and passing out, and I keep getting drugged or sent off into bloody nightmares.” John ran a hand through his hair, amazed at the words coming out of his mouth and what his life had turned into in the past twenty four hours.

 

“This has nothing to do with ash, and everything to do with that story. Basil is an idiot.”

 

“That’s not a very nice thing to say to your only friend and confidant up until this fellow came bursting into your life.”

 

John practically jumped at the appearance of said skull at his elbow.

 

“Please!” He shouted before controlling his temper. “Stop doing that.”

 

“Oh no, it’s far too much fun.”

 

Sherlock leveled a glare in his direction. “What is it now? You only show up when things are about to go sideways so that you can enjoy the impending chaos or when you feel the need to chaperone.”

 

“Chaperone?” John asked but was dutifully ignored by both of them.

 

“I’m just simply here to enjoy your banter. You two are so very adorable.”

 

John rolled his eyes skyward, leaving his head back as he focused on taking in slow, even breaths.

 

“See?” Basil said while gesturing to John as if he were the most entertaining thing in the world. “He’s so keyed up, it’s amazing he hasn’t burst into flames yet. You really should do something about that, Sherlock. You know, play something for him, it does wonders to calm him.”

 

John pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m. Right. Here.” He punched the words out, severely disliking being spoken of as he weren’t present.

 

“Oh, that’s a lovely idea, Basil! Yes, Sherlock, won’t you play something for us?”

 

Mrs. Hudson had just appeared at the landing of the stairwell, tea service in hand. It rounded out their quartet and made the stairwell feel overly claustrophobic with so many bodies present.

 

“This is getting rather ridiculous,” Sherlock noted.

 

“ _Getting_ ridiculous?”

 

He looked at John’s incredulous face. “You have a point.”

 

John nodded and moved himself away from the remaining trio in the stairwell. The kitchen door was open and he backed through it, making his way to the cupboard underneath the sink for the scotch bottle he’d left there all those years prior. To his immense relief it had not been moved and he poured himself a healthy three fingers worth before striding into the living room and taking a seat in his chair. The three amigos in the hallway be damned, he thought. He needed a drink and a moment to think.

 

He was barely given two seconds of peace before Sherlock appeared before him, coat still on and and a look of determination painted all over his face.

 

John would not be swayed. “I’m not leaving this flat again until we figure out the meaning of the children’s story.”

 

“I know.”

 

John looked up, surprised at Sherlock’s response. He watched as Sherlock slowly and deliberately took off his coat draping it over the back of the desk chair and then stepped over to the music stand in the corner by the window, where his violin case lay resting against the bookshelf.

 

John almost laughed in resentment. “You’re not actually going to listen to Basil, are you?”

 

“You are keyed up, John.”

 

“So? Who are you to actually take advice from anyone?”

 

Sherlock shrugged, tightening the bow. “It’s sound advice.”

 

John turned his head, looking away at the fire in the hearth as opposed to the intense focus he saw in Sherlock’s eyes. It was always unnerving when Sherlock unleashed his entire attention on him, and John shifted in his chair. The flames danced before them in the hearth yet John couldn't bring himself to enjoy the soothing crackle and pop of the fire. He could feel Sherlock's eyes on him and the ever-present gravitational pull that the man could exude on anyone he wanted. Currently, it seemed, he wanted John's undevided attention, but he'd be damned if he gave in so easily to that penetrating gaze. 

 

He took another sip of scotch, steeling his resolve. It didn't stop him from wanting to ask Sherlock why he'd so easily been cowed into a new distraction from his goal. 

 

“What happened to going out?”

 

“The world will wait for us, John.”

 

 


End file.
